"I'm fully familiar with the use of various weaponry, grappling hooks, and personal rocket packs. I have also done consulting work for Mr. Vader, a well known businessman who spearheaded the creation of a large spherical space station.
"That would be because Win2k/XP is written to reboot automatically instead of dispay a blue screen. I'm surprised you've seen one at all."
Um, yeah I would see that. You see, I do a little thing on my computer called work. When it goes missing, I notice. And believe me if XP did pull shit like that on me, I wouldn't be defending it.
Texture painting and Matte paintings. There's also some touch up of video. I recenty used Photoshop to digitally remove some cars from a video. (It was just an experiment, though...)
"(rotoscoping in photoshop is a major PAIN IN THE ARSE! film-gimp it's damned easy.... I am never using photoshop for anything but making simple graphics for after-effects."
What does Film Gimp do to make that easier? I haven't done rotoscoping yet so I'm curious.:)
"we can make linux take over video and movie production by simply coming up with decent replacement for aftereffects and a video editing app that isnt very early alpha,unuseable, unstable... (cinderella, mainactor)"
"The first SDK for this software ("Skynet") should be out in about 18 months."
6 years later, after the war is over, the OSS community will have finally finished making an Open Source copy of the system. There were no problems with the launch of Kskynet as it didn't have enough features to make it self-aware.
"RTFM. It's sht [options] [caliber] [number of bullets], where -l is for lead bullets, -number is how you specify the number of the body part you want to shoot (where the default is in the air), -h for high velocity, and -q for auto reload. How much easier could it get?"
I tried to use the auto feature for caliber, and it wasn't working. I had to look that up. Oh, and it's -H not -h. Stupid man page had a typo in it.
"I'm not looking forward to the BSOD on my toaster..."
You're two versions behind on Windows. Would you find it funny if I made a joke about how a Linux based toaster would have a USB port, but the kernel wouldn't know what to do with it? No, because Linux supported USB years ago. Think about it.
"Linux has won not only renderfarm servers, but the artist desktops of the top studios."
Well, that startled me to a degree. A good chunk of the artists out there doing 3D stuff need Photoshop. What are they using in its place? (or do they have a Mac room running Photoshop elsewhere?)
"are they going to suddenly come up with a miracle optimization because they need to meet a deadline?"
Why not? Movie studios tend to push the limits of the tools they have available. This means that they run into problems that the software wasn't originally designed for. All they'd have to do is massage the code to their particular situation.
I can give you a hypothetical scenario. Lightwave's a kick ass 3d package. It can be used in a wide variety of things. But if you were using it to animate 1,000 monsters coming down a hill, you'd find yourself wishing you had terabytes of memory. Lightwave doesn't have an instancing feature. Thankfully, though, Lightwave has a neat little SDK. So somebody could write a plugin that says "first render this model in this pose here, then move the model over to where the second guy is supposed to be and render it over there, rinse and repeat...". I think it's called instancing. Instead of having 1,000 monsters in RAM, you just have one.
See what I mean? Granted, nobody has the source code to Lightwave but the company who made it, but imagine if they did. A few nights of coding would save a few weeks of render time.
"Of course. We all know the 'net is a safe haven free from product placement."
eh, I didn't write that very clearly. I didn't mean that the product placement itself was the problem, but rather that they try so hard to push a product that the rest of the show is unwatchable.
Yes, there is product placement on the net, but it's not all that destructive.
"On XP Pro, I can get a spontaneous reboot sometimes by hitting the windows key while in a directx game (such as Rise of Nations). That fucking Windows key is right there next to ctrl, alt, shift, etc. too -- so it's not an uncommon occurence when I'm in a hurry in a game (like Half-Life, etc)."
I can't make the same claim for XP that I did for 2k. I'm using it on my laptop here, and though it's a nice OS, I'm glad the nature of my machine is that I reboot it once a day.
It's fine if it stays up and running, but putting it into suspend mode usually sets up a chain of events that requires a reboot.
Yeah he is begging for a smackdown. However, he does have a point. Since 2k BSODs are virtually gone. I can personally attest to this across 10 machines. I beat my machine pretty hard. I have a dual proc at work and at home, both are rendering stations. I constantly go well over the gig of RAM I have, and despite that I still have an uptime of around 2 weeks. After that, Outlook sometimes crashes. Reboot time.
Hopefully you can understand that I need to be able to rely on my machines to finish an over-the-weekend render. I'm not trying to be an MS zealot here. If being a zealot meant ignoring stability issues with Windows, I'd be out of a job.
"Unless they also hand out pamphlets on how to arrange your room according to THX standards, you'll get, at best, average sounding audio. At least this is how I understand it. Anyone?"
Even if the situation is exactly as you describe, at least you get a set of instructions on how to build your THX room. You'd only have to build it once for the certified games instead of one for each new game that comes out.
Is your sound going to be, at best, average? Well, if all the games are certified that way, then yes.:P The point is that the sound has to be good coming from the console before it can be good in the room you're in. It's up to the end-user to have good audio hardware and environment too.
"So if I'm right EA is NOT the first to get the THX certification...and this isn't a new idea."
If you had RTFA, you'd see that THX has been approached a number of times before for this. (i.e., no it's not a new idea, nor do they claim it to be) What is new and interesting here is that they're gearing up to support games (plural) down the road.
"It still needs reboots. It acts better once rebooted. In generalm Win2k and XP get alower the longer they run, and start experiencing problems like randomized icon images,"
That may be a problem with your machine, but it's not a general problem with Windows. If it were, I wouldn't be able to do artwork on it.
"I guess they would have had to add a hard reset button to all windows keyboards, which would then be in competition with the letter "e" for the key that wears out the fastest."
That joke would have been funny in 1999. Today, it's about as funny as jokes about Linux not supporting USB.
"Of course, theory and practice aren't on speaking terms right now, so enjoy your $30 cable and your malfunctioning market."
I'm not sure I agree with your definition of malfunctioning market. Basically what happens is some things are marked up really high, and others barely break even. The result is that prices fluctate from place to place, thus catering to the discriminating customer.
A fair price is simply the price a customer is willing to pay for any given item.
Listen dudes, just because it's got a high percentage of profit, doesn't mean it's a rip-off. It's an example of supply and demand. If $5 USB cables are being sold for $30, then it's because enough people are spending $30 a piece to buy them. When people stop paying $30 a piece, the price will drop.
It really is important to understand this concept of business. Just because they can sell it cheaper doesn't mean they should. Remember, they're not just selling you small quantities of material, they're selling you a tool that helps you do a job.
You're right, however it would be relatively trivial to make the UI explain the resampling button a little more clearly. Heck, why not put it in the print options? "File/Print... how big do you want this image to be printed?"
Slashdot Mirror
"I'm fully familiar with the use of various weaponry, grappling hooks, and personal rocket packs. I have also done consulting work for Mr. Vader, a well known businessman who spearheaded the creation of a large spherical space station.
References available upon request."
Professional Weaknesses:
- Once knocked into a Sarlacc Pit by a blind man.
"That would be because Win2k/XP is written to reboot automatically instead of dispay a blue screen. I'm surprised you've seen one at all."
Um, yeah I would see that. You see, I do a little thing on my computer called work. When it goes missing, I notice. And believe me if XP did pull shit like that on me, I wouldn't be defending it.
"The early bird gets the worm" vs. "Good things come to those that wait."
I prefer this one:
"The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse always gets the cheese!"
"They were just making a point."
Actually I think it was more likely they were karma whoring.
"why do they need photoshop?"
:)
Texture painting and Matte paintings. There's also some touch up of video. I recenty used Photoshop to digitally remove some cars from a video. (It was just an experiment, though...)
"(rotoscoping in photoshop is a major PAIN IN THE ARSE! film-gimp it's damned easy.... I am never using photoshop for anything but making simple graphics for after-effects."
What does Film Gimp do to make that easier? I haven't done rotoscoping yet so I'm curious.
"we can make linux take over video and movie production by simply coming up with decent replacement for aftereffects and a video editing app that isnt very early alpha,unuseable, unstable... (cinderella, mainactor)"
Agreed.
"We still occasionally get BSODs on XP at work. Not as often as 98, but they are still there...
It will stop being funny when they are gone."
It was December of last year when I saw a BSOD in XP. The joke's not funny. Tell it in 1999 and it's hysterical.
"The first SDK for this software ("Skynet") should be out in about 18 months."
6 years later, after the war is over, the OSS community will have finally finished making an Open Source copy of the system. There were no problems with the launch of Kskynet as it didn't have enough features to make it self-aware.
"RTFM. It's sht [options] [caliber] [number of bullets], where -l is for lead bullets, -number is how you specify the number of the body part you want to shoot (where the default is in the air), -h for high velocity, and -q for auto reload. How much easier could it get?"
I tried to use the auto feature for caliber, and it wasn't working. I had to look that up. Oh, and it's -H not -h. Stupid man page had a typo in it.
"I'm not looking forward to the BSOD on my toaster..."
You're two versions behind on Windows. Would you find it funny if I made a joke about how a Linux based toaster would have a USB port, but the kernel wouldn't know what to do with it? No, because Linux supported USB years ago. Think about it.
"Too late, they already put Windows on my gun, and it just keeps rebooting when I pull the trigger."
I tried to commit suicide using a Linux based gun. Unfortunately, by the time I figured out the right switches for the sht command, I felt better!
"Linux has won not only renderfarm servers, but the artist desktops of the top studios."
Well, that startled me to a degree. A good chunk of the artists out there doing 3D stuff need Photoshop. What are they using in its place? (or do they have a Mac room running Photoshop elsewhere?)
"are they going to suddenly come up with a miracle optimization because they need to meet a deadline?"
Why not? Movie studios tend to push the limits of the tools they have available. This means that they run into problems that the software wasn't originally designed for. All they'd have to do is massage the code to their particular situation.
I can give you a hypothetical scenario. Lightwave's a kick ass 3d package. It can be used in a wide variety of things. But if you were using it to animate 1,000 monsters coming down a hill, you'd find yourself wishing you had terabytes of memory. Lightwave doesn't have an instancing feature. Thankfully, though, Lightwave has a neat little SDK. So somebody could write a plugin that says "first render this model in this pose here, then move the model over to where the second guy is supposed to be and render it over there, rinse and repeat...". I think it's called instancing. Instead of having 1,000 monsters in RAM, you just have one.
See what I mean? Granted, nobody has the source code to Lightwave but the company who made it, but imagine if they did. A few nights of coding would save a few weeks of render time.
"Of course. We all know the 'net is a safe haven free from product placement."
eh, I didn't write that very clearly. I didn't mean that the product placement itself was the problem, but rather that they try so hard to push a product that the rest of the show is unwatchable.
Yes, there is product placement on the net, but it's not all that destructive.
"On XP Pro, I can get a spontaneous reboot sometimes by hitting the windows key while in a directx game (such as Rise of Nations). That fucking Windows key is right there next to ctrl, alt, shift, etc. too -- so it's not an uncommon occurence when I'm in a hurry in a game (like Half-Life, etc)."
I can't make the same claim for XP that I did for 2k. I'm using it on my laptop here, and though it's a nice OS, I'm glad the nature of my machine is that I reboot it once a day.
It's fine if it stays up and running, but putting it into suspend mode usually sets up a chain of events that requires a reboot.
I haven't noticed product placement in a long time. I've noticed the WWE endorsing the Rock's new movie, if that counts.
I say let them pollute TV with product placement, if ppl get tired of it, they'll go on the net.
"Overly Critical Guy" reads like a total fanboy."
Yeah he is begging for a smackdown. However, he does have a point. Since 2k BSODs are virtually gone. I can personally attest to this across 10 machines. I beat my machine pretty hard. I have a dual proc at work and at home, both are rendering stations. I constantly go well over the gig of RAM I have, and despite that I still have an uptime of around 2 weeks. After that, Outlook sometimes crashes. Reboot time.
Hopefully you can understand that I need to be able to rely on my machines to finish an over-the-weekend render. I'm not trying to be an MS zealot here. If being a zealot meant ignoring stability issues with Windows, I'd be out of a job.
Hopefully that clarifies my position here.
"Has anyone home-brewed a radar system of any type? "
A friend of my dad used to work on a ship many moons ago. He said that birds would fly in front of the radar and be cooked in mid-air.
No, I've never home-brewed a radar system.
"Unless they also hand out pamphlets on how to arrange your room according to THX standards, you'll get, at best, average sounding audio. At least this is how I understand it. Anyone?"
:P The point is that the sound has to be good coming from the console before it can be good in the room you're in. It's up to the end-user to have good audio hardware and environment too.
Even if the situation is exactly as you describe, at least you get a set of instructions on how to build your THX room. You'd only have to build it once for the certified games instead of one for each new game that comes out.
Is your sound going to be, at best, average? Well, if all the games are certified that way, then yes.
"What do desk types have to do with sound quality?"
I get a pretty good beat going on my desk sometimes.
"So if I'm right EA is NOT the first to get the THX certification...and this isn't a new idea."
If you had RTFA, you'd see that THX has been approached a number of times before for this. (i.e., no it's not a new idea, nor do they claim it to be) What is new and interesting here is that they're gearing up to support games (plural) down the road.
"It still needs reboots. It acts better once rebooted. In generalm Win2k and XP get alower the longer they run, and start experiencing problems like randomized icon images,"
That may be a problem with your machine, but it's not a general problem with Windows. If it were, I wouldn't be able to do artwork on it.
"I guess they would have had to add a hard reset button to all windows keyboards, which would then be in competition with the letter "e" for the key that wears out the fastest."
That joke would have been funny in 1999. Today, it's about as funny as jokes about Linux not supporting USB.
"Of course, theory and practice aren't on speaking terms right now, so enjoy your $30 cable and your malfunctioning market."
I'm not sure I agree with your definition of malfunctioning market. Basically what happens is some things are marked up really high, and others barely break even. The result is that prices fluctate from place to place, thus catering to the discriminating customer.
A fair price is simply the price a customer is willing to pay for any given item.
Listen dudes, just because it's got a high percentage of profit, doesn't mean it's a rip-off. It's an example of supply and demand. If $5 USB cables are being sold for $30, then it's because enough people are spending $30 a piece to buy them. When people stop paying $30 a piece, the price will drop.
It really is important to understand this concept of business. Just because they can sell it cheaper doesn't mean they should. Remember, they're not just selling you small quantities of material, they're selling you a tool that helps you do a job.
You're right, however it would be relatively trivial to make the UI explain the resampling button a little more clearly. Heck, why not put it in the print options? "File/Print... how big do you want this image to be printed?"